


Mamihlapinatapai

by isawrightless



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Superboy (Comics)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-29
Updated: 2016-05-29
Packaged: 2018-07-10 23:33:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7012801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isawrightless/pseuds/isawrightless
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mamihlapinatapai:</p><p>    A look shared by two people, each wishing that the other would initiate something that they both desire but which neither wants to begin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mamihlapinatapai

Kon observes as Tim and Cassie talk. The round table in the middle of the kitchen and the coffee getting cold. Cassie is nodding her head, blonde locks covering half of her face, tiny wrists resting on top of the table. Tim is using a casual speech pattern; clear and calm. It doesn’t feel weird, but when he speaks he’s so articulated, never tries to prove his point, never needs to, and sometimes he smiles over the course of the conversation and Kon catches that smile and keeps it framed on his mind. It’s a beautiful smile, white teeth and chapped lips, and Kon likes it better when there’s no cowl to outshine the dimples and the jaw line. For some reason the dimples are the best part. Perhaps it’s because they let Kon know that Tim is really smiling, a smile so wide that all the lines of his face have to move and shift to make room for it. But Tim isn’t smiling at all right now. Cassie, however, is. Tim reaches for his mug and takes a sip, frowns at the cold liquid and Cassie asks him to stay and Kon’s heart skips a beat and when Tim says he doesn’t know.

 

The sun is setting and, if Kon moves, the chair is going to creak and he doesn’t want that, doesn’t want their attention. Not right now. So he sits still. Sunsets remind him of the time he used to live in Hawaii. If he closes his eyes he can picture everything exactly like he remembers. The wind on his face and the sense of freedom. Sand between his toes and the smell of the ocean. There is nothing like that smell, nothing will ever come close. He was just a boy —still is— but nobody had died and things were quieter, calmer. And if he could go back, well, he wouldn’t. He can’t leave his friends, he can’t stay away. They make him better and it’s pathetic how much he wants things to go back to normal. He wants to be okay with Cassie, he wants Tim on the team, he wants Tim—-

It scares the living hell out of him when he thinks about it. How much he wants that boy. It’s not something he decided out of the blue. No. It settled in, the feeling, and it crippled him on the inside, ate the bones to reach the heart, dried the blood, and the process hurt more than anything. The realization of being in love with his best friend, of not knowing when it happened, knowing only that the feeling won’t go away. Tim’s eyes are haunting and deep and they go pale under bright lights. Then Tim’s hands, hands that fit so neatly under his and long fingers and knobby knuckles. And Kon’s in love with all of him and it’s terrifying.

Kon feels something hitting his head, and he would be startled if he hadn’t heard Bart’s footsteps coming through the living room.

“Can’t take your eyes off of her, can you?” Bart tries to whisper as he sits on the empty chair next to Kon.

Kon looks at himt and he’s talking about Cassie, of course he’s talking about Cassie. Cassie that is so beautiful; Cassie that is so amazing; Cassie that radiates light. But then Kon glances at Tim and he’s looking back.


End file.
